Hamedeh Rastaei; Hassan Karami
Abstract
Avicenna and Mullā Ṣadrā both provide coherent programs for spiritual discipline (Riyāḍah) that apparently pursue similar goals. Yet beneath these outward similarities lies a ...
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Avicenna and Mullā Ṣadrā both provide coherent programs for spiritual discipline (Riyāḍah) that apparently pursue similar goals. Yet beneath these outward similarities lies a fundamental distinction rooted in their differing anthropological foundations: the soul as a static substance versus the soul as a fluid being in a state of becoming (Ṣayrūrah). Employing an analytical‑comparative approach, this article first examines the fivefold anthropological principles of the two philosophers (the origin of the soul, the perfection of the soul, the role of the body, the levels of the soul, and its relation to the Active Intellect). It then demonstrates how these distinctions affect the pathology of the soul and the prescription of healings. In Avicennian philosophy, the soul is a static substance that employs the body as a temporary instrument, and the levels of the soul are its accidental states. Consequently, the obstacles to the soul’s perfection (psychic diseases) have a “passive” nature, meaning the domination and contamination of this static substance by bodily faculties. In contrast, from Mullā Ṣadrā’s perspective, the soul is the product of substantial motion (al‑Ḥarakah al‑Jawhariyyah) and a reality in a constant state of becoming. Thus, obstacles to perfection acquire an “active and existential” nature, namely the intensification and consolidation of the soul at lower, animal levels of existence. This fundamental difference gives the threefold goals of spiritual discipline-emptying (Takhlīyah), adornment (Taḥliyah), and the refinement of the innermost soul (Talṭīf al‑Sirr)-an ontological interpretation in Transcendent Philosophy, transforming them from a merely purificatory program into tools for substantial perfection. Spiritual discipline in Avicenna’s view is a psychological process for purifying the static substance of the soul, while in Mullā Ṣadrā’s view it is an ontological and existential movement for the flourishing and intensification of the soul on the path toward union with the Intellect and the sacred realm.
